Monday, May 14, 2007

Okay, this story started as a nice piece about Frank Miller's Hollywood love affair. I was calling it "Frank Miller.... Hollywood's Boyfriend!" But while looking up pics for the text, I found this, vile, sad thing:

I originally thought it was a mock up, made by a fan or a prankster, to emblazen Spirit fans with hateful murder toward Miller, but looking here, I found out that this seems to actually be part of the early marketing?

This ugly piece of lazy modern Miller art is used, instead of work like this?:

or this?

or this?

or this?

And to top it all off that Miller quote to Variety, I'd read many times before, hung sharply at the bottom of the page:“I intend to be extremely faithful to the heart and soul of the material, but it won’t be nostalgic. It will be much scarier than people expect,”

This is a nice piece I read, about Miller taking over Hollywood. See Alan, it only took decades of pain! Come back in five years and let's get Tim Roth to make a real John Constantine movie!! Miller deserves some power, even though if you read the entire article (here!) you'll see the posturing of a crazed law and order meathead, but that is why they love him....

Revenge of the Dark KnightHard-edged comics guru Frank Miller is hot in Hollywood. Now for the graphic details.By Geoff Boucher, Times Staff WriterApril 29, 2007

......Miller, the most important comic book artist of the last 25 years, is enjoying his moment in the Hollywood sun. There was, of course, the record-breaking March box office of "300," a lovingly faithful adaptation of Miller's bloody 1998 graphic novel, but there's also the two sequels to "Sin City" now in the pipeline and the Batman project now being filmed in London that borrows its title from Miller's 1986 masterpiece, "The Dark Knight Returns." "They finally got the title right," Miller said with a pretend sneer. "I was wondering when that would happen."

....Like most stars of the comic-book community (where he is the rare artist who became equally celebrated as a writer), he had become accustomed to be treated like a valet by Hollywood — Hey, kid, thanks for the keys and the vehicle, here's a couple of bucks — and then forced to watch the studios wreck everything on screen. The 1990s Batman movies, for instance, would not have happened without Miller's work, but they often ignored or trampled his contributions to the character. ..... Elektra, a beloved character he created, tanked badly on the screen in the hands of others.

Now there's a sweet satisfaction in the fact that the new Hollywood approach is to hire fan-boy directors and show fawning respect for the source material. "Sin City's" Robert Rodriguez even insisted on sharing director credits with Miller on those films (a maverick stand that cost Rodriguez his membership in the Directors Guild), and that led directly to a somewhat shocking development: Miller has now been tapped to write and direct his own film based on Will Eisner's classic noir hero "The Spirit."

One of the producers, Michael Uslan, also the producer of "Constantine" and executive producer of "Batman Begins," said the filming will start this year and that there already is intense interest from distributors given the splashy success of "300," which grossed $70 million in just its first weekend. Uslan was an executive producer on more than half a dozen superhero movies, including the Tim Burton "Batman" films, and he said Miller's relative newcomer role to Hollywood is not a problem.

"Honestly, to me, there's nobody else that could do this film. I saw him at Will Eisner's memorial service last year and I told him that I'd been turning comic books into movies for years, but that with 'Sin City' he's doing something better: He was making movies into comic books. I told him he had to make 'The Spirit.' He said there was no way he could do it. Then after three minutes he said, 'There's no way I can let anybody else do it.' "

....The mid-1980s brought the shift of comics toward more mature ambitions and Miller (along too with Alan Moore, writer of "The Watchman") was at the center of the renaissance. His defining characters — Daredevil, Elektra, the aging Batman of "Dark Knight," the disgraced samurai of "Ronin" — were solitary, haunted, honor-bound and extremely efficient at hurting other people. Reading Miller, Mickey Spillane and Clint Eastwood sprang to mind, especially when one Daredevil cover was an overt homage to "Dirty Harry."

Miller also became an outspoken champion of artist's rights in the industry, and he engaged in serious work to celebrate the legacy of past stars, among them, Eisner, who died in 2005 at 87 and was the creator of "The Spirit," a work often hailed as the "Citizen Kane" of comics. The artists had a close friendship, and Miller seems more nervous about his film living up to the expectations of his late mentor than he does about any pressures from producers or the public.

"There's quite a standard there, and I feel a tremendous responsibility and honor doing it," Miller said. He chewed on the thought some more. "It is a lot of pressure, though, yes."

...Miller will need all his supporters and his strength to pull off the new role as solo director of a major Hollywood film. He surely learned a lot at the side of "Sin City's" Rodriguez, but the new job requires not just artistic antennae but also an efficient dictator sensibility.

"He can do it, absolutely," said "300's" (director, Zack) Snyder, "because he has the respect instantly of the people around him because of his vision. I saw on the set of '300,' he won people over because he knows what he wants, and what he wants is great. He's in this unique position now where he is a brand name. Like Quentin [Tarantino], there's this perception that his take on pop culture is so singular and right that he gets to break the rules."

UPDATED!!!Aintitcool has a possible little, tiny, trailer description I thought would go nicely with this little post.I found it here!

Hey Harry,My brother IM'd me a moment ago with a description of the Dark Knight teaser, saying I may report this to the nearest movie site or whatever. Apparently news about this has not been heard yet, but here goes: Black background, cards begin to fall in slow motion, the joker whispers things directed at Batman, the audience, the final card to fall is the joker, with also a picture of the bat signal on fire. My bro works in Holywood, got the video from a guy who does the credits for videos. yep.

Tuesday, May 08, 2007

UPDATE!!! Pics of IRONMONGER have popped up! I got these at IESB, but I don't know who had the original scoop!Superherohype has some big, meaty pics of "ol' Shellhead" straight from the source. Notice that the armour is called Mark III, as in third suit maybe?(from here!)

Paramount Pictures has provided us with these hi-res versions of the Mark III armor and a new shot of Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark in Marvel Studios' Iron Man, opening May 2, 2008.

The film tells the story of Stark, a billionaire industrialist and genius inventor who is kidnapped and forced to build a devastating weapon. Instead, using his intelligence and ingenuity, Tony builds a high-tech suit of armor and escapes captivity. Upon his return to America, Tony must come to terms with his past. When he uncovers a nefarious plot with global implications, he dons his powerful armor and vows to protect the world as Iron Man.

Wednesday, May 02, 2007

When I was 12 and Frank Miller was the long haired, cool looking rock star among comic creators, I wished that Hollywood would worship him and see him for the genius he was. Now, as a 34 years old, I still see Miller's work as brilliant, but also sadly pubescent and overly macho the way a four or five year old boy is macho when he wants ice cream now and that means he gets ICE CREAM NOW DAMMIT!

I still enjoy Frank's long overdue rise to power and I hope he finds great achievement in his film version of the great Will Eisner's The Spirit, which is genius on a more eloquent level. I only wish that Alan Moore could be heralded the way that Miller is. I wonder what Moore thinks of this.

Ronin is the next thing I read after Batman: The Dark Knight Returns kicked my ass into my brain. It's good. Really good and really violent. Not Watchmen, not even close, but good.

Five year old violent kid. Is it really a wonder that Hollywood loves Frank Miller, but doesn't get Alan Moore? Someday someone will..

May 2, 2007The next Frank Miller adaptation is one step closer to the big screen.

"Ronin," an early Miller comic miniseries from the early 1980s, has landed at Warner Bros. Pictures, which has acquired feature film rights. Sylvain White ("Stomp the Yard") is in negotiations to direct.

Miller, a comic book auteur, has developed a Hollywood following, with such titles as "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns" and "Sin City," which Robert Rodriguez adapted into a 2005 film. Miller's "300," adapted by Zack Snyder, cut its way to $206.9 million at the domestic boxoffice. Miller created "Ronin," published by DC Comics, after his acclaimed run on the Marvel Comics series "Daredevil" in the early '80s.

The story centers on a ronin who is reincarnated in a dystopic near-future New York populated by squatters, factions and mutants. The ronin must try to destroy a demon with a mystic sword, which also is found in New York.

Look what just popped up at EW.com (here)I must say this looks like Ironman!I have high hopes for this to be the next great Marvel franchise!!

Exclusive: This is ''Iron Man''Sneak a peek at the new robo-suit that will turn Robert Downey Jr. into a comic-book legend in the May 2008 movie

By Jeff JensenIron Man is the latest Marvel Comics superhero to jump from splash page to big screen. (The film is due May 2008.) Director Jon Favreau (Elf ) began shooting in March with star Robert Downey Jr. — in his first comic-book role — as the man inside the cybernetic Mark III suit (pictured) and Gwyneth Paltrow as his trusted assistant. In the film, Downey plays Tony Stark, a playboy industrialist who decides to don high-tech armor to fight baddies after suffering a life-threatening heart injury in war-torn Afghanistan. ''This is a decidedly adult superhero story,'' says Favreau. (Fanboy FYI: Look for Stark's legendary drinking problem to pop up in possible sequels.)

Faithful to the comics and constructed by Oscar-winning F/X maestro Stan Winston, the Iron Man togs — a far cry from Stark's normal black-tie attire — are robo-cool but make for restrictive, sweaty duds. ''Robert was very bullish on wearing the suit whenever possible,'' says Favreau of his star, who bulked up for the role. ''Now I don't know if he's such a fan of that idea.''Posted May 02, 2007